The Unemployed Life
2009 Was a Big Year for Start-Ups
Isn’t it nice to be validated? For more than a year, we’ve been talking about all the new businesses that would be started as a result of the recession. We knew there were people who felt liberated by being laid off or by quitting miserable jobs, and others who were launching start-ups because they didn’t see any job openings out there.
According to a new survey by Challenger, Gray & Christmas, 8.6 percent of unemployed managers and executives started started businesses last year, a four-year high.
“The start-up rate might have been even higher if banks had loosened their lending standards,” pointed out John Challenger, the company’s CEO.
Here’s a really interesting tibit: a whopping 88 percent of job-seekers over the age of 40 were starting businesses. We think of entrepreneurs as young risk-takers, but that’s not the case anymore!
The Kauffman Foundation supports these findings. Last year, it put out a report about the coming boom in baby-boomer businesses.
These are people with tons of experience and insight, and even if many are creating companies because job opportunities are scarce, it seems like a really positive development. We’re so curious to see how it changes things.
Interested in who’s starting what? Our Lemonade Makers series profiles downturn entrepreneurs.
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I strong think the start up rate is due to so many people getting laid off and really thinking outside the box to slowly get things up and running for themselves.